A probing equipment employed in testing semiconductor integrated circuits is constructed with a probing card that is a printed circuit board on which very fine needles are fixed. An electrical transmission from an integrated circuit to a test equipment which analyzes electrical information from the integrated circuit is accomplished by contacting the needles to input/output pads of the integrated circuit. Electrical signals for testing are transferred to the test equipment through the probing means.
Otherwise, to perform a test function against internal signals of semiconductor integrated circuit such as dynamic random access memories, static random access memories, and non-volatile memories like read only memories needs a more precise apparatus that is a micro probing equipment. The micro probing equipment checks the internal signals being active in a low frequency and contacts probing needles to test pads through which signal lines in the semiconductor integrated circuit are connected to the test equipment.
However, there are several problems in such a micro probing device. First, the internal signals passing through the signal lines may not be transferred to the probing card or would be distorted from their original forms, because of parasitic loading factors existed in the probing needles, such as resistance, capacitance, and inductance. The second is that an area occupied by test pads is becoming relatively larger in proportion to an increase an integration density of the semiconductor memory devices. The third demerit is that there would easily occur physical damages such as an injury of test pads, or a snap-down of signal lines, because the needles on the probing card move in a tremble or other environments. And, a time for preparing a test system to connect the micro probing apparatus to test equipment is longer than those of other test types, causing an increase of a whole test time. Those problems relevant to the probing apparatus for testing high density semiconductor memory devices are not helpful in promoting fail analysis and development of semiconductor integrated circuit devices, thereby resulting in a degradation of manufacturing yield with them.